The Bloom Upon the Bough
by Mariagoner
Summary: When memory speaks, one must answer. An ongoing series of short stories featuring Penelo, Larsa and Penelo X Larsa continues. Features a healthy smattering of genres, including romance, drama, tragedy and humor.
1. Renewal

Title: The Bloom Upon the Bough, Chapter 1

Fandom: Final Fantasy XII

Pairings: Penelo X Larsa

Rating: PG-13

Summary: There's a difference between need and desire, between what you want and what you'll receive.

Disclaimer: Nothing but the particular combination of words in this piece belongs to me!

Note: This will (hopefully!) be the start of a series of loosely connected ficlets and drabbles centering on Penelo and Larsa, pending general interest from the public and continuing inspiration from the game. So please, if you've enjoyed or disliked this starting piece, let me know! I love feedback that let's me know what does or doesn't work and what might be an interesting new way to go in the future.

Also, please note that since this series of fanfiction contains some sexual situations and innuedos, most of the drabbles take place a few years AFTER the end of the game, when Larsa is in his late teens and Penelo in her early twenties. I can write a lot of things, but I can't write chan.

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There's a difference between need and desire.

Larsa Ferrinas Solidor knows, perhaps more than anyone else, about the needs of his world. He knows how many pounds of rice must be harvested every year to feed the people of cities and how many taxes can be imposed upon the poor until their livelihood is ruined and how many levies can be placed on the rich until they groaned. He knows how much money it takes to repair roads destroyed by acts of God and buildings by acts of armed resisters. He knows to a man how many soldiers are in his army and how many resources need to be taken from the earth and from the people to keep them securing the boundaries of his empire. He knows, as perhaps only Ashelia B'nargin Dalmasca does, of the precise weight a kingdom can exert upon its ruler. And he knows, to an almost painful degree, how much his people still have need from him, from all of the house of Solidor.

Larsa knows need and how it can be met so easily with the body of a Rozarrian noble woman in the throne beside his own. Larsa understands need and the cries of his people and knows how to subdue them both as painlessly as possible.

But desire is a different beast altogether.

Desire is a girl from the gutter, flaxen hair held back from her face and shocked eyes calling to him for help. Desire is a hand tentatively placed in his, short nails raking the fabric of his gloves. Desire is the tip of her fingers, tentatively stroking his face and wiping away the trecharous tears that had fallen after he had truly understood the weight of the legacy he was the only survivor to. Desire is the moonlight that had lit her from within as she had lain sprawled across his bed, gaze absent of any thought of another and arms already pulling him down to her. Desire is her face buried in the curve of his neck, the heat of her mouth pressed against his ear as she had assured him, once and for all, yes, yes, she wanted _this, _more than she'd ever wanted anything else in the world.

Desire is love and desire is want, mingling together until even the emperor of Archadia knew not what was what. It has no place in his world in the same way, not the way need does, but he can't deny it anymore than he can deny her.

Larsa knows more than anyone else in the world that there's a difference between need and desire. But when he closes his eyes and thinks of Penelo as he last knew her...

_(eyes closed, tears beading his shoulder, arms like lilies wrapped around his neck before the world parted them once more, god, once more)_

...He can't quite recall how it mattered.


	2. Comedic Interlude

God help me even more, I've updated my other FF XII fic and tried to come off as funny in this installment. I'm not sure if, in between all the bunny girl and tentacle jokes, something actually humorous happens. But much love, regardless, goes to anyone who manages to get all the references to the game herein-- especially the one centered around the most sadistic gameplay sidequest ever formulated.

And BTW, thanks for all the reviews the last time around! Nothing inspires your friendly neighborhood fanfic writer more, especially around the holidays.

Title: The Bloom Upon the Bough, Chapter 2-- The Comedic Interlude!  
Fandom: Final Fantasy XII  
Pairings: Penelo X Larsa X Vaan friendship  
Rating: PG-13 (Tentacle Monsters Ahoy!)  
Summary: "Did you ever wonder," Vaan said one day, out of the blue, "where on earth Larsa keeps all of his potions?" An ongoing series of drabbles featuring Penelo and Larsa continues.

OoOoO

"Did you ever wonder," Vaan said one day, out of the blue, "where on earth Larsa keeps all of his potions?"

Blinking, Penelo stood back to stare properly at him. It was a nice enough day on the Giza Plains, if one didn't mind massive torrential rains, a side-quest cooked up by the most sadistic level designers since the ones in Dragon Quest, and terrifying elementals that seemed to like to chase innocent people with a pressing need for pocket change all over the place.

(But those were probably more Penelo's issue's speaking than anything else.)

Still, it was a nice enough day on the Giza plains, Penelo's massive hissy fit with miscreant game developers aside, when Vaan had interrupted an otherwise peaceful (in the sense that almost everything around them had been enthusiastically killed) stroll about the place with his question.

Looking up from her bored search around the plains perimeter (where the HELL was that last withered tree, anyway?! the best part of whatever game developer had come up with that ran down his mother's legs), Penelo pondered. And pondered. And pondered some more. Finally, face screwed up tight in concentration, she had to admit, "I don't know. I never really bothered to think about that."

In the midst of scuffing more mud into the already dirty river waters, Vaan turned at Penelo with a frown. Penelo bravely overlooked the innate hilarity of watching him try to think. "Seriously? You never noticed all those times he practically pulled a pharmacy out of nowhere and saved our rear? Even when he kept us alive during that one time we tried to fight that stupid white blobby thing and we had to restart from our last save point-- which wasn't even in the sewers-- when the stuff with tentacles kicked out butts before we could touch him?"

It still upset Penelo to remember how close she had come to death by halitosis. "Those were called Marlboros and you were the one who was responsible for that. It took Fran weeks to get all the slime out of her hair and I still think she's planning to kill you in your sleep for taking her along then."

This time, it was Vaan who shrugged. "Who knew that bunny girls wouldn't get along so well with things with tentacles? But it's still weird though-- Larsa, not the bunny girls. Although I guess they're pretty creepy too. How the hell do they even make misanthropic little bunny babies without guys around?"

It was times like these when Penelo was tempted to throttle her very best friend in the world just a little bit. "We're not even up to the Viera side-quest part of the plot yet! Do you want the author of this to smack you upside the head in the next chapter for not following the storyline?"

Vaan just shrug it off. "Like she could do anything worse than what someone in Japan is drawing about me right now. But, think about it-- how the hell can Larsa even afford to be a drug dealer's nightmare? We couldn't even afford one high potion the last time we went to Rabanastre-- and that was only two days ago."

That, at least, was something Penelo could answer, hands on her hips and voice pitched into that know-it-all tone she knew would drive Vaan nuts. "That's because you decided to spend all our money on, I quote, 'that kick-ass pole I can't even use yet but I'm sure I'll get the points for soon!' As though you didn't already steal a Deathbringer. And I don't know if you've realized this yet, Vaan, but he's sort of like, you know, royalty. He's Emperor Gramis' son, for god's sake! His pocket change alone is probably worth more than what we managed to rob off that elemental a while back."

They paused to share a look of quiet desperation with each other. Poor Basch always had been the bravest of them all. It was a real pity that the last shopping trip had left no money for a spare phoenix down.

"Still," Vaan muttered, not even bothering to try and look for another stupid tree to chop down and shove into the river, "that still doesn't explain where he keeps them. He's so tiny and he uses so many and I just can't figure out how that'd work."

Penelo just shrugged and slung her gun off her shoulder, already seeing the faint shape of another walking LP point in the distance. "Who cares? And who really thinks any of us make good clothing choices anyway? You can't afford a shirt, I can't put on a pair of pants, and I'm not even going to go into what the hell Ashe wears from the waist down. As long as Larsa's willing to be the manliest twelve year old ever the next time we meet, I'm not going to worry about where he keeps any of his potions."

"Yeah," Vaan finally said. "Larsa's pretty tough for a kid who's voice hasn't even cracked yet. And I guess if he ever ran out of pockets, he could always store some up his--"

Even as a child, Penelo had known that Vaan would lead an interesting life. It was a real pity that it had ended so suddenly.  



	3. Speak, Memory

After possibly flunking the Psychology GRE (I think my present exam scores are hovering somewhere around the level earthquakes start), I needed a little pick-me-up. And since I've become a scary emotional exhibitionist as of late, I rounded out a draft that's been languishing on my computer enough so that it actually became postable. So voila! I hope you enjoyed reading this first stab at a romantic comedy (?!) as much as I did writing it.

And as always, reviews are adored, loved, cherished and looked back upon whenever I try to think of new things to write. So please, if you have any comments, questions or ideas for future drabbles, let me know.

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Title: The Bloom Upon the Bough, Chapter 2--

Fandom: Final Fantasy XII

Pairings: Penelo X Larsa future fic

Rating: Light R

Summary: "Do you remember the first time we met, Penelo?" An ongoing series of drabbles featuring Penelo and Larsa continues.

Note: This fanfic takes place about 10 years after the end of the current game.

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"Do you remember the first time we met, Penelo?"

There were a lot of things that Penelo had thought she'd talk to her lover about after their first time in bed. As a young girl, she had rather firmly subscribed the hearts-and-flowers school of romance, which dictated that any man of hers would probably have to spend his days catering to her every wish and whim as well as serve as her personal defense force and knight in shining armor. The last bit aside, her childish plans hadn't worked out very well, what with her running off as a teenager to become an air pirate's navigator and the love of her life spending most of his formative years ruling an empire. Going by those standards, she supposed she shouldn't really be surprised that her first bit of pillow talk with the emperor of Archadia wasn't exactly going point-by-point to romantic expectations either.

Still, even a few years back, Penelo would have been baffled by what just shot out of her bed mate's mouth right after what they had spent the last hour doing. But here they were, bodies still warmed from each other's heat, hands still cupped around each other's bodies, legs still tangled hopelessly in the ruins of their bed. Here she was, feeling ridiculously happy and loose-limbed and languid, as though there was nothing in the world that could ever shake the peace she had found just here, just now, in the tiniest cot available in a palace full of wonders, sprawling all over the one she loved most of all. And here he was, her Larsa, face warm and gentle and relaxed in a way it hardly ever was when the crown of Emperor hung heavy on his head, running the fingers of his free hand through her pale hair and patiently waiting for an answer.

It might have taken them years and years to find each other again after they saved the world, and years more to learn to appreciate what they had and not look for impossible goals... but here he was with her now, her lover, looking at her expectantly as his question lingered in the perfumed air around them. And unwilling to leave behind the challenge in his eyes, the mystery and the tenderness that lay beneath his smile, Penelo leaned again into his opened arms and took the bait and bit.

"I couldn't forget any of it if I tried! But then, it's hard to blank out any situation that involves being kidnapped by a crazed bunch of Bangaa bounty hunters and squired halfway about the world in order to kill a dashing space pirate, no matter high much you try. I had nightmares about it for weeks afterwards."

When Larsa pouted, he looked strangely like the young prince she had first met almost a decade ago. It was by turns appealing and alarming. "And I suppose I was just an afterthought of the whole escapade?"

Penelo couldn't repress her laugh. "Well, of course not! Even if the circumstances hadn't been so dramatic, I'd have still remembered you, of course."

Larsa wriggled one eyebrow at her in cheerful self aggrandization. "No doubt because I came to your rescue from the dastardly Judge Ghis at the last minute so heroically and cunningly."

Penelo smiled at the memory, so many years old and yet still so loved. "He really was only a little way off from tying me to some railroad tracks, wasn't he? And admittedly, you were the manliest twelve year old I'd met up to that time. But also... well... I don't know how to say this..."

"Yes? What else? Please go on!" She had always liked it when Larsa got this excited, when his eyes sparkled down at her with real heat and happiness, though his charming habit of reddening at her slightest provocation had (mostly) been erased by politics over the years. It was almost a shame that she'd have to deflate his ego shortly.

"You also had the nicest hair of anyone I'd ever seen in my entire life! So soft, so straight, so free of tangles... I seriously went about for days afterwards wondering if I should take down my braids and a cut like yours. I still wonder that, occasionally. If anything, it's only gotten nicer as the years have gone by."

She had never seen Larsa lost for words before; she supposed it was a sight she'd come to savor in the years to come.

But for now, it was rather bewildering to see someone whose words she took for granted speechless. "Larsa? Larsa? Are you all right? Is it something I said?"

He looked a bit blue in the face when he found his voice again. "I-- I guess it is. I don't mind being admired for a lot of things, Penelo, but I never expected someone would look up to me for my coiffure."

Penelo made a hmmm of thoughtful consideration. "Well, technically speaking, nobody was really looking up to you just then."

By now, he had recovered enough to muster up a proper glare. "Ha ha, very funny."

"Well, it's true! I think you only came up to my chin when we first met." Even Larsa had to smile a bit.

"In my defense, I was only twelve. And the manliest twelve year old you had ever met at that."

Propping herself up by her elbow, Penelo allowed herself a long, hearty leer at the man so barely covered by the cool sheets they were still tangled in. "That's true, they don't make 'em the way they used to at your age."

It was rather amusing to see that Larsa could still blush after what they had just done together-- and nice to know she hadn't lost her touch completely. "But anyway, we've strayed far afield. Penelo, seriously, do you remember the first time we met?"

She couldn't quite hide the smile the memory bought up. "Even without the crazed Bangaa bounty hunter factor, yes. I don't know if you've realized it yet, but you're the sort of person that's rather hard to forget. So... er... is there anything you wanted to talk about in particular?"

Now it was his turn to smile mysteriously. He always did like having a trump card up his sleeve. "Nothing important, really. I was just thinking of the first time I had ever heard of you. Before I even saw you, as a matter of fact."

Now this was new information. Penelo sat up a little in their crooked little bed. "...Really? You did? You never told you about that."

Penelo abruptly found one dark eyebrow thrown up at her. "You never wondered about how I knew your name when we first met, before we were even properly introduced?"

She laughed a little self-consciously. "At that point, given how confident you seemed, I wouldn't have been surprised if you turned out to be telepathic."

And there-- there was that mischievous grin again, the one that could make the core of her shake in anticipation. "No, currently I'm just telekinetic. Give me a few weeks, though, and I'll work on it."

She grinned back. "Telepathy aside-- and believe me, you really don't want to know what goes through my mind sometimes-- now you've got me curious. How did you know my name?

Larsa gave her the you-know-better-than-that-Penelo look he had mastered after all these years. "Who else in the party at the time had the biggest mouth and most concern for your welfare?"

Penelo had to shake her head at the thought of her old friend. "Oooh, I walked right into that one, didn't I?"

No one person should be allowed to look so smug for so small an oversight. "Perhaps."

Larsa got a proper whack of the arm for that and shook it off, grinning. "So, what did Vaan tell you about me?"

Still grinning, he replied. "Oh, just the fact that you were his friend and that you had been kidnapped. For him, it wasn't much at all. It was my imagination that did the rest."

Now, this piqued up her own. "Oh, is that right? And what did your imagination say about me that Vaan left out?"

And suddenly, Larsa was looking at her in that way that younger boy she had met a lifetime ago did before, in that way that could both break her heart and mend it completely. "Only that you'd be the loveliest maiden-in-distress in the world, fair of face and kind in deed, willing and able to change my otherwise hopelessly dull life completely."

Even through the sudden prick of sentimental tears, Penelo had to smile at that last bit; Larsa was a very skilled flatterer when he wanted to be. "And when you finally met me, was I everything you wanted me to be?"

And suddenly, without so much as a by-your-leave, there was his mouth against hers once more, his fingers stroking her breasts and his hips nudging her into a state of trembling, tactile alertness. When she finally could open her eyes after his shameless (and successful) attempt to take her breath away, her world was filled with his tender face.

"What do you think?"

"I think," Penelo began, slowly, carefully, brown eyes meeting blue with a spark, "that I'd very much like this to be the start of something else and if you want that as well, you'd better get started already because we're not getting any younger and I like you most at this age anyhow."

Laughing, Larsa slipped down to give her another kiss, and the rest of the night passed by them all too quickly.


	4. Holiday Greetings

Happy New Years, everyone! And just to start off the year productively (crossing my fingers here), I'm posting up the second of six holiday drabbles/short-stories/who-knows-what requested from my f-list this year. This segment is dedicated to Selphish, who is an awesome mod, a great friend, and who wanted to see Larsa and Penelo deal with Christmas Presents. I hope you enjoy muchly.

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Title: The Bloom Upon the Bough, Chapter 4-- Holiday Greetings

Fandom: Final Fantasy XII

Pairings: Penelo X Larsa future fic

Rating: PG

Summary: The emperor of Archadia had never had much experience with children before. An ongoing series of stories featuring Penelo and Larsa continues.

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The emperor of Archadia had never had much experience with children before.

For one, he had barely had a childhood himself. Sired by an aging ruler of about as grand a land imaginable, he had grown up to be the flower of a prince, to be a credit to his court, to be a miniature adult from the time he could talk. He had spent his earliest years being reared by the lawful protectors of his land, being drilled in courtly etiquette and fencing techniques and the proper way to collapse the governments of the smaller realms that slowly but surely were swallowed up by his own.

All of that had left precious little time for him to learn to be merely himself, merely a young boy set adrift in a world he felt wholly responsible for. In fact, as far as he could recall, the only time he had ever _really_ felt the lightness of his years had been when he had been only fourteen, when he had danced with a barely older beauty with light in her hair and fire in her eyes, at the coronation for a queen he had all but placed upon her throne recently.

But even that time had been passed him by almost a decade and a half ago, and the crown he wore upon his brow had aged him far afterwards. Nowadays, when Larsa looked into the mirror, at the gray already peppering his hair and the dark lines etched beneath his eyes, he felt about 290 years old, instead of only 29. He could barely remember being a man of 19, let alone a 9 year old boy.

No, Larsa had never had much experience with children before. But looking at the ruddy, wrinkled face of his newborn son, Larsa knew that this would change quite quickly.

"Merry Christmas," the empress of Archadia whispered to her husband. Smiling and blinking back the tears that were already prickling his eyes, Larsa took his wife's hand in his own.

After all, of all the lavish gifts any ruler could expect to receive on an eve such as this, she had just given him the best one possible.


	5. In Another Life

Mea culpa for this. I just couldn't finish that second chapter of Sexual Politics in time to post this week so I just yanked a much older fic up and posting it here. In any case, this morsel is for **Ladyassassin**. She asked me to write about jealousy and my mind ended up here. Apparently I am unable to write about such without dipping straight into tragedy. My apologies to Dante Alighieri and Jorge Luis Borges ahead of time.

And comments, corrections and criticism are, as always, completely welcome and loved. After all, a little encouragement never fails to add a bit of inspiration...

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**Title: In Another Life**

**Fandom: Final Fantasy XII**

**Series: Bloom Upon the Bough, Chapter 5**

**Characters/Pairings: Larsa/Penelo**

**Rating: PG-13**

**Summary: In another life, perhaps. Just never in this one.**

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Whenever she pictured him, she would see him first as he had once existed, a young boy before his would-be-bride within their library sanctuary. In the farthest, dearest, most intimate corners of her mind, he would always exist, perpetually young and perpetually studying, the smooth, dark strands of his hair cascading over his face and onto the words of his current volume of text, only to be brushed haphazardly away. In that one part of her that neither time nor adversity could touch, he would always lie before her in the fire of his manse, pale face glowing with gentle happiness and thin lips parting to show flashes of small white teeth, smile growing only wider and wider as he found yet another morself from his stacks to puzzle her with entirely.

In that kernel within her, she could keep the memory of what he had once been safe, unable to be tainted by anything.

"Look at this," he would say. "Listen to this if it doesn't bother you excessively." And then he would quote from one of his fathomless texts, their philosophical density somehow only compounded by his calm, cool voice, by gestures meant to convey meaning she could not find therein. And he would speak what were merely meaningless ephitets to her, from Coleridge, from Schopenhaur, from Dante, from the Greeks: 'Laborious orient ivory, sphere in sphere-- Life is a sickness of the spirit-- leben ist eine, krankert des geistes, en leidenschaft lichen ten-- don't let the Masons say the Church introduced these atrocities-- Bridebed, childbed, bed of death, ghostcandled-- It thinks-- questi, che mai de me non fia diviso--"

So he would go on, busy , busy with a world that largely precluded her but so intent on folding her within it anyway. So she would go on, rising to the edge of her seat, watching the fire paint bright, flickering sparks on the forever young and timeless face. So they would eventually find themselves kneeling together in a light flickering and fierce, looking and looking and looking at each other as if any moment either could fade away without warning. Because even then, at only seventeen, he had known as well as she did that once someone left, once someone walked away, there was always the possibility that this would be the last glimpse of them you would ever see.

He was an orphan and she was an orphan and they knew loss as well as they knew the warmth of each other's bodies. He had known and she had known and every touch they had once given had held the trickle of the river of Acheron between their aching bodies. And the world was not kind in that case, would never be kind in any case, and she was not his and he was not hers and they had no means between their two bodies to bind each other fast and to keep each other safe.

But still would she keep his memory within her, sacrosanct enough to make her ache with longing, till she was old and still and gray.

Because always, always would she remember that absurd creature near the fire's light; always, always would she be imprinted with the memory of his face and his eyes, his voice and his smile, and the irredeemable voice that drifted out of the darkness, imprinted with the wisdom and the scholarship and the bewilderment of centuries, of questions as to why he could not have what he desired over and above everything.

And never, never would she, accursed from the first moment she had met him, doomed to never possess what she loved more than anything, forget that all that made her want him so fiercely was everything she understood and deserved least.

She would always remember him, all face and fervor, all lilt and languor, that irredeemable voice drifting in and out of her memory. She would always remember him, pale lips parting with a smile as he told her again about that ancient tale of lovers narrated by a pitying torturer, by a man who had known of both ardor and agony. She would always remember him and his impossible stories, as strange as ever the light of idealism had been to her. Because she knew that, after they parted, there would never be any recourse for them, as for the doomed lovers he had spoken of before.

They had not even hell as a meeting ground. When they had parted, they had parted forever and nothing could bridge that ending.

"Whenever I think of love, Penelo, I think first of Paola and Francesca from that most divine of comedies. Do you think they were happy, side by side in that infernal paradise? Even if they could not touch, even if they could not speak?"

She would always remember him, onyx and ivory and just as irretrievable as anyone else she had ever loved, lips brushing against hers as he told her about destiny.

"Questi, che mai da me non fia diviso-- which of course means 'this one, who shall never be parted from me'..."

She would always remember his words about those doomed lovers, could do naught but remember his stories.

"Do you think they were happy together, my Penelo? Do you think that fate could one day be ours to meet?"

She would always remember him and those doomed lovers he had spoken of, united despite everything in a heaven that would never part them, in a hell that would never cease.

"Shall I exist for you eternally, even after we have both wasted all of our living years?"

With appalling love, with anxiety, with admiration, with envy.

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**Author's Note**: And in case you're still a bit confused as to what's going on, the following quotation from an essay Jorge Luis Borges wrote about Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy may clear matters up. Note that the last line of this piece comes straight from Borges.

"Beatrice existed infinitely for Dante. Dante very little, perhaps not at all, for Beatrice. All of us tend to forget, out of pity, out of veneration, this grievous discord which for Dante was unforgettable. Reading and rereading the vicissitudes of his illusory meeting, I thik of the two lovers that Alighieri dreamed in the hurricane of the second circle and who, whether or not he understood or wanted them to be, were obscure emblems of the joy he did not attain. I think of Paolo and Francesca, forever united in their Inferno: "questi, che mai da me non fia diviso" this one, who never shall be parted from me. With appalling love, with anxiety, with admiration, with envy." --Jorge Luis Borges, 1978, pp 103 from Selected Non-Fictions.


	6. Tiny Dancers

This is just a small, cute, fluffy bit of nothing for the even more adorable **Laxhal**, who wanted to see Penelo meeting-- and reacting!-- to hot!older!Larsa. I hope you rock your upcoming exams, hon! And in case anybody noticed, this was inspired by this incredibly sexy piece of fan-art so much love also to the original artist whose site, alas, seems to have gone down since I first saw it.

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**Title: Tiny Dancers**

**Fandom: Final Fantasy XII**

**Series: Bloom Upon the Bough (Chapter 6) **

**Characters/Pairings: Larsa/Penelo**

**Rating: PG-13**

**Summary: Puberty can sometimes hold the most I interesting /I of surprises, as Penelo finds out...**

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When Penelo first met the present day Emperor of the Archadia, he had been perhaps the sweetest little boy she had ever laid her eyes on.

Back then, of course, he had not been the grand and exalted Emperor of Archadia, ruler of everything he could survey from outside of his palace balcony. Back then he had merely been Larsa Ferrinas Solidor, occasionally also called Lamont, a twelve year old boy who had apparently had a yen for running about the countryside in green tights and cherry red heels, rescuing any imperiled maidens he came across along the way. Even now, when she thought of him, the very image of his bright green booties could make her smile no matter what she was doing.

The last time Penelo had met Larsa, he had been as sweet as ever, albeit not quite as tiny as during the first time she had laid eyes upon him. They had danced at Queen Ashelia's coronation, his hands fumbling around her hips as he had tried to move his awkward adolescent limbs into some semblance of order, and she had put his arms around his flushed neck and kissed his thirteen year old forehead and ordered him to write to her no matter what situations might crop up while he was ruling his country. She had used her bossiest voice, the one that could make even Vaan stand up and pay attention when he goofed around with Migelo's merchandise, and Larsa had blushed pink in a way he would never have never done a year earlier and promised her plenty of letters, come hell or high water or the fall of important territory.

But this time when Penelo met Larsa, he wasn't simply a boy who was slowly adjusting to his place in the world-- he _was_ fully and truly the person he had been born to be now. As the Emperor of one of the grandest kingdoms of all of Ivalice, he was a true man of the world now-- one who seemed perfectly in control of all that his station required from him, from what she could see. It was… actually kind of surprising considering how tiny and how delicate he had been the last time they had met each other in the flesh.

And he hadn't exactly stopped growing since the last time she had seem him either.

The first thing that Penelo noticed about Larsa, Emperor of the Archadian empire, when she met him again for the first time in years, was how, enshrined within the base of his powers in Archades, he seemed so calm and at ease. Most of the royalty Penelo had seen in her life, Dalmasca's own Queen Ashe not excepted, often went around looking as though they had stray bits of cutlery shoved up various orifices as a sign of good breeding. Thankfully, even half a decade as serving as an emperor hadn't turned Larsa into a self-important fop. When he stood up to greet her, he wore effortless and well-tailored clothes that somehow both suited his station yet had a pleasing simplicity that kept him looking as much of a strutting peacock as most others of his court. And when he walked rose and began to walk towards her, Penelo, began to notice… other things.

The second thing that Penelo noticed about Larsa was that he was now taller than her. When they had first met, the boy that Penelo had come to love as a dear friend had barely come up to her chin. Now, the boy-- the man-- that Penelo still loved (as a friend!) had almost a full head on her. Apparently, age tended to add to a man's stature. Penelo found this perhaps more baffling than the circumstances warranted.

And the last thing that Penelo noticed about Larsa was that, from a strictly aesthetic point of view, he had grown up to be rather... well. Once a charming young boy with delicate, elfin, very nearly girlish features, he had grown into a man who had the sort of face and figure that did not so much match the current standards as ridicule them as being entirely too narrow. Penelo had known men who had far more symmetry to their features than Larsa would ever have… but the aura of power and sheer dignity he held far eclipsed anything she had previously seen.

She'd give the previous Emperor of Archadia this much. Gramis might have been a bastard who had ruled the Archadian empire with an iron fist and sired at least one complete lunatic... but his sons sure did have a tendency to grow up nicely. It had been noticeable enough in Vayne's case... but it was almost ridiculously apparent here.

Apropos of nothing, Penelo suddenly wondered if her hair still looked nice after the long and bumpy ride to the capital of her old friend's empire. And then, aware that she might have been gaping at said long-time friend with something less than completely dignity since the minute she had stepped into his private office for a visit, Penelo managed a smile. "It's been a long time since we last met each other, Larsa! How have all the years been treating you?" Then, a rather ridiculous notion struck her mind and made her lips curve up even more. "Or should I call you _His Majesty_ now, as Uncle Basch said would 'befit your station'?"

With a soft laugh, eyes fixed on her face, Larsa answered. "Yes, quite well, given all the strange circumstances that have passed me by and no, absolutely not, no matter what Judge Gabranth might say. You might even consider the last an imperial order from said Majesty, if that is what it takes."

She just grinned at him in return, fighting down the distinct feeling of _something_ fluttering in her body. "Would it matter if you did? I don't think you're the boss of me-- I'm a lady sky pirate now and the only directions we take are from the skies unceasing!"

It was probably just the lighting that made it look as though a soft flush was chasing itself all over Larsa's gentle face. Damn that… unreliable… natural lighting…"Ah, is that right? I should not have held any doubts about that from the first, really. I know you, above all others of my acquaintance, would not bow down to chase my every whim to reality."

For a minute, Penelo seriously had to consider the possibility that this entire meeting with her friend might just be some sort of fever hallucination bought on by trying to drink Vaan under the table again to get first dibs at pirated treasure. Surely the _real_ Larsa Ferrinas Solidor would never have actually winked at her.

"Well," she said, faintly. She had outgrown her need to constantly stifle her surprise with her hands over her mouth over the past couple of years but she really, really wanted to do that just now. "That's… that's good to know. And really… really, you know that we've still got a lot of catching up do after so many years! So when are you going to start giving me the grand tour to everything?"

"Soon," Larsa promised her, smiling, even as he took a few more steps towards her until he was merely the length of an arm away. "Very soon. There will be time enough in the world for us to do that later. But first, I hope you don't mind if I inconvenienced you with one more act, now that I've been graced with your presence again."

And with hardly a pause to give him away, Larsa laced one of his hands against Penelo's free fingers, curved another against her hip and pulled her into a kiss that dropped the bottom out of her reality.

Penelo had done her fair share of kissing before, of course, but she had never thought she'd find herself smooching an _Emperor_ of any sort. And even more, she had never thought the kiss of a boy-- a _man_-- she had known for so long could feel so-- _astonishing_. Taken aback, Penelo could only flail about helplessly for the first few moments, only to calm down as she felt his hand lightly curve about the crest of her hip. Larsa's mouth was warm upon hers, his lips gentle and his tongue exploratory, and the hand entwined in hers trembled a little as he curved his fingers against her palm as he kissed and kissed and kissed her as though this moment meant _everything_.

And when he pulled back, Penelo could see the wide, almost mischievous smile across his face, the sort of smile she hadn't seen him give since he stopped wearing ruffled silk jabots and knee high pants in public. "I've been wanting to do that since I was twelve years old, Penelo. I'm sorry if I startled you but I used to picture this in my drea-- and in any case, I wanted to try it at least once in the world of waking reality."

Eyes wide and mouth still trembling, Penelo could only stare at him in amazement. "So... all these years... and that's why... you asked me here... and..."

Looking a little rueful, Larsa touched one hand to a rapidly reddening cheek. "I hope you didn't mind that. I don't mean to be forward but, Penelo, I really have wanted to . I thought… well, I suppose I thought it just the act to inagurate me into adulthood. So I-- I can understand if you're upset. But... But I didn't do this embarrass you. Not at all. It was… the farthest thing from my mind right here…"

And he was speaking the truth, surely, if the way he was looking at her now meant anything. Because Penelo had never particularly been a genius of any sort but she had always been good at reading people. And right now, the look in his eyes and the trembling of his lips and the blush across his face told her quite clearly that…

Finally, shaking off her stupor, she managed one more coherent question. "And if you've waited that long... was it really as good as you dreamed it would be?"

Eyes widening in hope, Larsa merely gazed at her in wonder for a moment. And then--

"I might need another try to be certain," he told her regally, seconds before he pulled her in for another kiss-- one that Penelo was happy to be able to reciprocate fully.


End file.
